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Stanford Hosts Pac-10 Championships

COMING UP: After finishing first and second at the Pre-NCAA Invitational two weeks ago, Stanford hosts the 2006 Pac-10 Cross Country Championships this Saturday, October 28 on the Stanford Golf Course. Ten women's teams and eight men's teams are set to compete for this year's conference title. The women's 6,000 meter race will begin at 10:00 am, followed by the men's 8,000 meter race at 11:00 am. The top-ranked Stanford women have won ten consecutive Pac-10 championships, while the fifth-ranked Stanford men will look to improve upon their six straight conference titles, having won nine of the last ten contests. Defending individual champion Arianna Lambie will also look to defend Stanford's five of the last seven individual women's titles. Lambie was named the Pac-10 Female Athlete of the Year for her efforts last season, while head coach Peter Tegen was named the Pac-10 Coach of the Year in his first season with the Cardinal.

STANFORD WOMEN FIRST, MEN SECOND AT PRE-NCAAS: Previewing the NCAA Championship courses to come in November, the highly-ranked Stanford men and women enjoyed successful outings at the 2006 Pre-NCAA Invite on October 14 in Terre Haute, IN. Eighty-seven women's teams and 86 men's teams competed at the invitational, split into two races based upon national rankings. The top-ranked women's team captured the Blue Race with a low score of 45 points, followed by Minnesota with 200 points and conference foe Arizona State in third with 224 points. The then third-ranked men's squad finished second in the White Race with 106 points, just behind Iona with 100 points. Florida was third in the White Race with 217 points. Redshirt-junior Arianna Lambie led the Cardinal charge with a runner-up finish in the Blue Race, logging a time of 20:20 to trail Wake Forest winner Michelle Sikes in 20:16. Teresa McWalters (4th, 20:24) and Amanda Trotter (5th, 20:27) logged top-five finishes, while Katy Trotter followed in eighth (20:32). In the men's White Race, redshirt-junior Neftalem Araia finished fourth in 23:30 to lead the Cardinal men to a runner-up team finish. Redshirt-sophomore Garrett Heath (24:00) and senior Brett Gotcher (24:02) also logged top-20 performances in 18th and 19th, respectively.

ASU WOMEN, OREGON MEN CHALLENGE CARD: The eighth-ranked Arizona State women and seventh-ranked Oregon men pose the greatest competition to the highly-ranked Cardinal at the 2006 Pac-10 Championships. The Sun Devil women posted a third-place finish in the Blue Race at the Pre-NCAA Invite behind Stanford and Minnesota to shoot up in the USTFCCCA national rankings. Three-time sophomore All-American Jenna Kingma led the ASU charge with an 11th-place finish at Pre-NCAAs, followed by junior Cassie Rios in 16th place. The Sun Devils lost former Pac-10 champion Amy Hastings, but should be bolstered by Kingma, who finished ninth at last year's Pac-10 Championships. The seventh-ranked Oregon men did not compete at this year's Pre-NCAA Invite, but recorded a team victory on October 14 at the Mike Hodges Invitational in Portland, OR. Individual champion and three-time All-American Galen Rupp led the Ducks to a perfect team score with a 14-second victory. Teammates Shadrack Kiptoo-Biwott and Carlos Trujillo finished second and third at the event. Senior Patrick Werhane was Oregon's top finisher at the 2005 Pac-10 Championships in 13th place, leading the Ducks to a sixth-place team finish.

2005 SEASON REVIEW: Both the men's and women's teams continued a legacy of dominant distance running last season. The Cardinal women captured their third national title in school history and second championship in the last three years. Arianna Lambie, Katy Trotter, Lindsay Flacks and Lauren Centrowitz all earned All-American honors as Stanford posted 146 points to runner-up Colorado's 181 points. The men finished sixth in the team standings for the second-straight season. Neftalem Araia was Stanford's top finisher for the second-straight year in 11th place to earn All-American honors. At the NCAA West Regional, the women posted a low score of 24 points to secure the team win, led by individual champion Lambie. All seven runners finished in the top 20, with five finishers in the top 10. The men were edged out by a talented Arizona team at the Regional, tallying 80 points for a runner-up team finish behind Araia's eighth-place individual performance. The Cardinal dominated the Pac-10 Championships, earning a 10th-straight women's team title and sixth-straight men's title, the men's ninth conference championship in the last 10 years. Lambie claimed the Pac-10 individual crown as the women totaled 34 points, while Araia took third place in the men's competition to lead the Cardinal to a low score of 46 points.

UP NEXT: Stanford will take a weekend off following the 2006 Pac-10 Championships. The Cardinal will return to action at the NCAA West Regional on November 11 in Portland, OR.

HEAD COACH Peter Tegen: Head men's and women's cross country coach Peter Tegen enters his second season on The Farm. In just his first season with the Cardinal, Tegen led the women's squad to its second national championship in the last three seasons and the men's squad to a second-straight sixth-place finish at the NCAA Championships. Prior to coming to Stanford, Tegen spent 30 successful years coaching cross country and track and the University of Wisconsin. For his efforts both at Stanford and Wisconsin, Tegen was named the Outstanding NCAA Division I Women's Cross Country Coach of the Past 25 Years by the USTFCCCA last spring. Tegen is joined by first-year assistant coach David Vidal. A 2006 graduate, Vidal spent five years racing for the Cardinal and ranks among the best steeplechasers in school history.